Communicative Competence-Based Syllabus Design for Initial English Speaking Skills

It is widely recognized that English is the only foreign language included as a compulsory subject in university level in Indonesia. However, few universities make effort to teach English according to students’ needs and level which in turn has negatively influenced the outcome of the teaching process such as the students’ low level of English proficiency. This study has two main objectives i.e. Firstly, it is aimed at improving the quality of teaching English at the university level by aligning the students‟ needs and the expectations of the lecturers, and graduates (a needs analysis) in designing a standard syllabus and developing teaching materials. Secondly, this research is intended to give contributions to the development of theory in syllabus design since this study provides different views and syllabus design framework from pre-existing syllabus design frameworks for a language program. This study is restricted to gather information on the students‟ needs as an essential part to design a speaking course syllabus which focuses on Speaking course one. Research and Development (R&D) design by using mixed method is used to carry out this research with three systematic steps i.e. preliminary phase, development phase, as well as review phase. 1. Step one (Preliminary phase). In this phase needs analysis (NA) is administered by involving 137 respondents (116 students, 10 lectures, and 11 graduates) who are selected using purposive sampling technique. The data are gathered through needs analysis questionnaire which are analyzed by using descriptive approach 2. Step two (Development Phase) The information of the needs analysis is then used to formulate the aims and the objectives for selecting course contents, designing syllabus, developing materials, and reviewing the materials. Two experts, who are purposively selected, have reviewed the prototypes of the teaching materials by using checklists which are then descriptively analyzed. 3. Step three (Review Phase) This phase is initiated by trying out the teaching materials which involved 3 English lecturers and 15 freshmen students who are randomly selected. To find out the effect of the teaching materials toward the students‟ progress in speaking, questionnaires and tests (pre-test and post-test) are used. The data are then analyzed by using SPSS 20. The findings of this research have found out two important novelties i.e. the first, a standard syllabus design for initial speaking skills with lesson plans and a set of instructional materials for eleven units and topics. The second, this study has also found a syllabus design model which here is called communicative competence-based syllabus design and a framework of communicative competence-based syllabus. It is highly recommended that teachers of English should consider using the results of this study as a formal a real example to design syllabus and to develop course contents for other English courses such as listening, reading, and writing courses.